Shaping Destiny

by Destiny Allison

Destiny Allison is an award winning sculptor and business woman, but that wasn’t always the case. Twenty years ago, she was trapped in an unexpected life. One night, in furious frustration, she picked up her children’s modeling clay, created a figure, and discovered she did not know herself.

In Shaping Destiny, Allison shares her story as if sitting over coffee with a close friend. While exploring what it means to fully engage in creative pursuit, she illuminates parallels between life and art and provides valuable tools for navigating the often perilous roads of each.

If you are an artist, or simply seeking to transform your life, this thought provoking memoir will further your journey by laying bare transformative moments, offering instruction that can be applied across media, and demonstrating the development of a unique and powerful voice.

“Destiny Allison has written a wonderful (!) book about the interaction of life and art, and the lessons to be gained from both. In drawing larger truths from the particulars of her own life, investing those truths into her art, and then relating that voyage of discovery to the rest of us with clarity and authenticity, Destiny Allison shares common ground with writers like Anne Lamott and Annie Dillard. This is no small accomplishment!” – Ted Orland, co-author of the best selling book, Art & Fear

“Allison pulls off a titillating combination of Eat, Pray, Love meets Art & Fear. We easily follow the evolution of her life and art, as she moves harmoniously between heartfelt emotion and mental clarity. The conscious parallels between the relationships in art and life she brings into view in Shaping Destiny click with my own truth that art reflects life and vice versa. Kudos to Allison for originality and brilliance.” – Nancy Reyner, best selling author of Acrylic Revolution

Genres: Art, Memoir

218 pages, Paperback

First published March 5, 2012

About the author

Destiny Allison writes books that stay with you long after you've finished reading them. If you're looking for a good romance, a fast who done it, or a fun, sci-fi adventure,you might consider looking elsewhere. While Destiny loves to read them, she doesn't write them. Instead, she pulls the best elements from each, adds fresh ideas, raw emotions, and powerful imagery to create characters and stories you won't forget.

She is the award winning author of Shaping Destiny: A quest for meaning in art and life, author of Pipe Dreams and Bitterroot (dystopian sci-fi) and just released The Romance Diet: Body Image and the Wars We Wage on Ourselves.

For more information, visit www.DestinyAllisonBooks.com or follow her on twitter @sfsculptor

Reviews

[Hilary · Rating 5 out of 5]

A must read novel!!

Shaping Destiny is a beautifully written novel about the journey Destiny Allison took to learn who she was as a person, mother, artist, friend and woman. This unique novel was written with such passion, skill and finesse that I from the very first paragraph I was drawn in and couldn't put it down. Destiny writing style is absolutely flawless and incredible. She paints a picture in your mind so vivid you feel as if it is your life. The entire journey I was taken on really hit home, being that I am a young woman, and showed me that if I find something I am passionate about I too can become the person I aspire to be.

Destiny Allison mixed the art and becoming a woman perfectly. She showed us how passion drives us, how woman are who they want to be and really drove home what shapes our lives. Men, don't think you can't read this novel and learn a thing of two. The life lessons can still be understood and the story is phenomenal! The most impressive part about this novel is how she manages to teach and entertain in a way that isn't Chicken Soup for the Soul-ish, very obvious *life lessons* that make you feel like a bad person. The one thing I wish I could have from this book...is more! I hope that Destiny Allison continues writing and producing literary gems like this one. I am your new and loyal fan!!

- HilyBee from Novel d'Tales

[Robert Richardson · Rating 4 out of 5]

The morning after I bought this book I picked it up intending to glance at it for a few minutes while I drank my coffee. Hours later I turned the last page, but I did not emerge from it all at once or return to my day unchanged.

I have never worked in metal, wax or clay, and I learned a good deal about how and why this might be done; but words are the medium here, and this revealing story shows how an artist with words can explore her own experiences, illuminate what is memorable in them, and share the truths she finds.

This is a book that speaks on many levels. The three voices the author employs--teaching, intellectual and emotional--give volume to her reflections and she uses them all to convey her animating belief that we have the power to shape our lives into moments of meaning and wholeness, whatever might be the materials that have been given to us.

"We seldom look at the shadows because the shadows can be frightening," she says, but her gift is to look at them with courage and exacting honesty as she invites us to do the same.

The wonder is that a book so aware of loss could be so affirming; a book so full of feeling could be so unsentimental; and a story so intimate and personal could have so much to offer every reader.

[Margaret · Rating 5 out of 5]

Don't begin reading this book until you've got a couple of uncommitted hours to read on. First chapter, first paragraph, and already there's an empathetic constriction in the heart, as you witness another's very personal and painful moment of truth. Although Destiny's story comes from the standpoint of a struggling artist as well as a struggling parent, her account is that of recognizing an undeniable passion in oneself, owning it, and trusting it to inform and shape one's life. Her unsparingly honest self exam is portrayed in a genuine, very human, and distilling voice.

[Diana Febry · Rating 3 out of 5]

It wasn't what I was expecting and I have learnt nothing about sculpture. The book was a combination of auto biography, an emotionaljourney and a study of the art of creating. It was thought provoking and honest. Every page was full of the author's passion for art and discovery of self within her art.I felt the writing was genuine and open and learnt a great deal of how the author felt and worked as an artist. I felt I understood how she grew as an artist but didn't feel I got to know her as a person. Interesting.A perfect gift for an artist friend.

[Luey · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved it...written from the heart and gives you a lot to think about regarding the creative process, and life itself.

[Kevin Brennan · Rating 4 out of 5]

In this superb memoir of becoming, Destiny Allison describes her evolution from young wife and mother to fully matured artist. It is a sometimes painful transformation and full of the misunderstandings that can occur when we are pulling away from our familiars (things, places, and people) and requiring that we be taken seriously. Allison makes us feel her emotional confusion and insecurity but uses clear, controlled, and always graceful language rather than indulging in the overwrought. She is a woman looking at her life from the vantage point of higher ground, giving her a voice of calm understanding.

Each chapter of the book begins with a brief, almost academic analysis of sculptural principles -- Allison is a sculptor as well as a novelist -- usually acting as a metaphor for the content that follows. It is an especially effective way of representing her progress, and it has the added purpose of teaching the reader about sculpture and the creative process in general. We learn about shapes and planes and how they project meaning, but we also see in vivid scenes how art and life are interrelated. All art is about emotion. The effective artist knows how to translate her emotions using the tangible elements of her medium, which, in this book, are the clay, wax, plaster, and the molten metal of sculpture. Allison also shows us how the effective artist has to dismantle her own work sometimes, when it is not telling the story she intends.

I’m not a habitual reader of memoirs because they so often seem either like pity parties or almost unbelievable horror stories, but this book reads as real-life experience without hyperbole or a tone of false suffering.

My only minor complaint is that I can’t see the sculptures that Allison describes. I’m sure that ebook-quality images wouldn’t do them justice, though, so I understand why Shaping Destiny isn’t illustrated.

[Travis · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a great book. Destiny did a very good job at giving detail about her live in a way that kept things very interesting. She also presented many ideas that made me stop and think about what I believed in. No I did not agree with her on some of those issues, but then we are all entitled to our own opinion. The main idea that sticks out to me is the notion of suicide. I do not agree with it and in fact I believe that it is the chicken way out. Now Destiny states that she feels it takes courage to commit suicide. But just because I did not agree does not mean she is wrong.
This is a book that I would recommend to others.

[Steve Ewers · Rating 5 out of 5]

This just released book kept me up reading till 2:30am. I made myself stop and finish it in the morning. And that was my second read through. The personal stories and lessions on art helped me examine things in my own life as I am exploring the meaning of what I have done and what I plan to do with my life.

Being a man, much of the deeply personal and emotional content is strange. Like many men, I don't do emotions well. I am working on it though and this book helped me on that journey.

[Katrina]

Honestly, I didn't really get into it. It was very term heavy, and though I know a lot about art, it could be pretty tough going for people who are interested in art, but are novices.

[Rohan Kar · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's choice that shape our destiny and could be achieved.

[Bridgette Guerzon Mills · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent book by a woman-artist-sculptor-mother. Honest and raw account of her life, her shape theories, and how her artwork developed.

[Sharon Lippincott · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not until I was several chapters into Destiny Allison’s memoir, Shaping Destiny: a quest for meaning in art and life, did I make the connection between the author’s name and the book title. When the lights finally went on, I was awestruck at the depth of the aptness. I could literally feel slippery clay beneath my hands as she described working on her sculptures, and my sense of her inner self slowly changing profoundly deepened. The continual dance between the state of her sculptures, her search for the meaning of words, and her understanding of various elements of her life thrilled me.

Before reading this book, I knew next to nothing about the process of additive sculpture, and I was fascinated by her explanations of the process, from concept through casting.

Sculpture served well as both metaphor and mechanism for her personal transformation from a traditionally female role to that of a self-determining, self-aware professional artist. Her interwoven accounts of the sculpture process and the evolution of her thinking helped me realize that the sculpture process is also an apt metaphor for the writing process, and presumably any creative process. She begins with a concept and builds a structure (armature) to support the further development of that process. Then she layers on the substance, adding layers of meaning and detail. Ultimately she gets down to the final steps of crafting the visible surface. Her concept is subject to change as the project evolves.

This much I followed easily. It corresponds perfectly to the writing process, with the initial outline or intention for the project followed by layers of paragraphs and scenes, each independently constructed. Ultimately final editing polishes specific words and phrases to a shine, and the message may shape shift between conception and publication.

Her studio encounters are also meaningful to writers. The tight knit cluster of kindred spirits working together in her studio served as a sounding board for Allison, and presumably also for each other, much like a writing group, as they challenged each other and hammered out concepts and meanings.

As much as I related to and was inspired by this book, it also strengthened my awareness that there are limits to what we can convey with mere words primarily due the lack of shared background. I knew next to nothing about the sculpture process before reading this book. I learned a lot. I would have learned even more if she had included illustrations. I got lost when she began discussing abstract terms like intersecting planes, the symbolism of shapes, and negative space. I feel certain these are meaningful concepts, but as adroit as she is with words, those lofty abstractions did not come through. I am disappointed that I am unable to find pictures anywhere of the early poem sculpture that filled several chapters of the book, shaped her thinking, and put her on the map as a sculptor.

Despite that lack, her skill in describing her process and the passionate enquiry she engaged in to deepen her own understanding and skill are inspiring. Ultimately I realized that these insights are highly personal, and we must each work them out for ourselves, in our own way and time. She uses clay. I use words. Others may use paint, musical instruments, acting, or physical activity. The choice of medium matters less than the use of one to discover and express our personal truth. Ultimately some of this truth may be beneficial and inspiring to others, but she seems to be saying that at least in the early stages, the fundamental value is more in the process than the finished product.

Allison did a superb job of pouring her heart and soul onto the page and creating an inspiring volume that bridges sculpture to other creative arts and life in general. Just as I do not share her passion for her specific art genre, but do recognize the value of her process, I also do not share her family background, but found the evolution of her family relationships both heartwarming and encouraging.

In closing, I want to commend Allison on the quality of her book. She chose to self-publish her work on CreateSpace, and it is professional in every respect. The cover is compelling, the layout is elegant and eminently readable, and I didn’t notice a single typo or grammatical error. She deserves extra kudos for exhibiting the same professionalism in publishing as she does in her art.

This review was originally published at StoryCircleBookReviews

[Robbie · Rating 5 out of 5]

One doesn’t have to be a sculptor to relate to the process Destiny Allison describes in Shaping Destiny. The author writes her story with poetry and wisdom reminiscent of Joseph Campbell, but from the point of view of an artist and woman. Through her quest to create a sculpture conceived from authenticity – be it from metal, wood or clay – we learn about life processes and the exploration that becomes necessary to build the foundation of such a creation.

The book reads like a suspense novel, making it extremely difficult to put down. As the story progresses, the metamorphosis of both art and artist becomes inevitable. The author recounts the angst of her family's past and considers the future and the choices that she will make, and we are reminded that this is very much a true story of a woman’s reality. Allison pulls her sculptures apart and starts over until she feels the connection. While she grows as an individual, so do her creations, and we get to witness the unfolding – the breaking apart and coming together as she welds, molds and constructs her life and art, embedding each one into the other.

Allison’s words are so much more than thought-provoking; they are heart-and-soul provoking in ways that aren’t always obvious but are always raw and honest. “Rebuilding a sculpture after you have carved too much away can be a difficult process,” she writes. Starting over is never easy, and one can’t help but hope that it will all come together: art, love and the pursuit of authenticity. There is no shortage of conflict or contrast, yet there is a sense of constancy in her journey.

If you’re looking for romance, you will absolutely find it here, not in a conventional way, since it becomes apparent that very little is conventional about the author. It is a love story: about partners, art, family and the quest for self-love as it rises from the ashes of pain and passion.

Throughout the book Allison eloquently weaves the metaphor of sculpting one’s own life with the literal creation of sculpting art. Even if you think you are not going through some kind of transition, by the time you finish reading Shaping Destiny, you will feel as though you have just experienced a major shift.

[Bonnie Kassel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Many concerned with the nature and history of art or the activity of creating what we call art, believe it started as a way to influence, manipulate or even placate forces and events we observed on the outside world. This sees the artist as a vehicle or vessel, in service of a shaman or teacher. This is art as a channel for external knowledge.

It is far more recently that we have come to practice art as a means of internal expression and discovery. This is where Destiny joins the conversation. In Shaping Destiny: A Quest for Meaning in Art and Life, Destiny Allison writes about art from the inside out. She relates with riveting details the reasons she sought out and began to engage in creative activities. It was a way to resolve contradictions and questions she had about herself. It was about how she loved and was loved, how she cared for and was compelled by her husband and her children. It was about her role in the world and how she saw herself and what she was missing about her self.

A powerful aspect of the book is Ms. Allison’s huge, and sometimes even ugly, questions about the things that go on between men and women. Here we are solidly in the contemporary view that artistic expression is more a conversation we have with other human beings about who we all are and how to shape that, than about shaping the world we are born into. That is for her the intensely personal nature of her art. Through the art we create, we share ourselves.


I loved the contrast of the intellectual “Lesson” that preceded each chapter before Destiny’s raw emotional voice was given full rein. This is a deep book, but there were enough revelations pertaining to family background and her tragically different parents to keep the book immensely readable. I cannot imagine a single creative person who would not enjoy (and benefit from) this book.

[Linda Parkinson-Hardman · Rating 4 out of 5]

When I was first asked if I might host Destiny on Woman on the Edge of Reality (http://womanontheedgeofreality.com) and write a review I was initially sceptical, after all this the autobiography of a living artist and, with the best will in the world, there is no way anyone would ever be able to accuse me of being an art lover. I visit the odd gallery or two, I love some museums, but I prefer my art to be something I can understand easily and not something I have to work at to understand.

However, I read the first chapter and was hooked. This is because, as someone that works with women for a huge part of my working day, Destiny accurately captured what they say and feel on a regular basis; and what they share with others in the same boat. What I found as I carried on reading was that this is not so much a book about Art, but about how Art became the means of self expression of a woman who didn't understand how to change herself and her life. It's certainly not an easy read though and it's challenging in many places, mainly because it makes you think about yourself and your own expectations and experiences of life; as a result some may find it a difficult read.

You don't have to be an artist to appreciate the book, but I do think you need to be open to putting your own life under the microscope to really get the full benefit of it. And so, to the interview.

[Cristina · Rating 3 out of 5]

This review was originally published in Local iQ magazine, Oct. 4, 2012.
http://www.local-iq.com/index.php?opt...

The subhead says it all about this memoir by sculptor Destiny Allison. She delves into self exploration as she equates her developing art form to the discoveries along her life journey from housewife to Santa Fe artist. The writing is thoughtful and thought-provoking, filled with poignant prose about creating and appreciating art. "We tend to look at light when we look at a sculpture. Light reflects off the high points and creates flow… We seldom look at the shadows because shadows can be frightening… Not only do shadows occur at the intersection of planes and moment of expression, they reveal to us the possibility of mystery. Shadows speak paradoxes and reveal other truths." Although the sentiment of a woman discovering her full potential at home and in her career choices felt a bit like trite 70s feminism, the use of the clay as a medium and the fine writing carried the compelling story. Currently, Allison is a managing partner of a community space in Eldorado that sponsors music, art, classes and community building events. She also blogs about art and writing at shapingdestinythebook.com.

[Miriam Feder · Rating 5 out of 5]

Destiny Allison writes a woman’s journey that reaches deep into the gut and illuminates the transformation of generations of women – who needed to be – who are mothers; now grandmothers; great-grandmothers; wives and lovers or women who just could not be. There are tears, frustrations, joys, loves, and friendships.

Her lessons to artists actually are illustrations of how to view your life in, out, in your space, and in the environment. Read it! It’s personal, transformational, tearful, and joyful. You might recognize yourself.

[Deigh · Rating 2 out of 5]

I did read the "Lessons" and I think there is some valuable reminders in them. I could not engage in the "belly button examination" that is the narrative at all. Too much 'cosmic princess' for my taste.

[Tim Walsh · Rating 3 out of 5]

Won this last year from a giveaway. I found it interesting, but I didn't finish it because of schoolwork.